


Minds That Have To Whisper See In Them A Sister

by geckoholic



Series: author's favorites [3]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Biting, Character Is Like Catnip To Supernatural Beings, Dream Invasion, F/F, Horror, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Nipple Play, Non-Graphic Gore, Oral Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-30
Updated: 2017-09-30
Packaged: 2019-01-07 06:56:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12227874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geckoholic/pseuds/geckoholic
Summary: Marcela is about to turn around, end her midnight stroll through the village and head back to her grandmother's house, when she sees the silhouette of another person hurrying down the street ahead of her. A woman, young and slender, her long blond hair looking almost white with the moonlight glinting off it. Marcela calls out to her before she can stop herself.





	Minds That Have To Whisper See In Them A Sister

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Tish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tish/gifts).



> Mostly went with the requested tags we matched on, in particular _dream invasion_.
> 
> Beta-read by nightbulbs. Thank you!! ♥ All remaining mistakes are mine.
> 
> Title is from "Transylvanian Concubine" by Rasputina.

Out here in the countryside, the nights are darker than in the city. Marcela has seen quite a few of the latter, Paris, London, Moscow, and they all shine bright, illuminated by the lights and lives of millions of people, by neon offerings for leisure and pleasure and all the things urban people deem to be necessities. No such brightness here, way off from any city. The only light that keeps the night from being completely impenetrable is the faint glow of a waning moon. The village is asleep, even the houses that are still inhabited have fallen dark too, and as she walks down abandoned streets, Marcela doubts the decision she made two weeks ago, on a whim, as a last resort, doubts that her returning to the place that bears her roots has been a good idea. 

The peace and quiet would be good for her, she had thought. Let her breathe, calm down, remember who she is. But it's _too_ quiet here. Almost every other person in this godforsaken village is the age of her grandmother, few people are the age her parents would be now, and the contrast is too stark. She wants to go back to the vibrating, bright and colorful life she knows, has thought about taking a train to the capital, but this is a detox and that would equal taking another hit of the drug she chose to ban from her life, for now. She's not ready. It wouldn't just be a day trip. She wouldn't come back. She'd find somewhere shiny to capture her attention, her mind overwhelmed by the possibilities all over again. But this isn't working either. The first few days, it did, when even this was new and different. Now she just spends too much time listening to her own thoughts. Marcela is about to turn around, end her midnight stroll through the village and head back to her grandmother's house, when she sees the silhouette of another person hurrying down the street ahead of her. A woman, young and slender, her long blond hair looking almost white with the moonlight glinting off it. 

Marcela calls out to her before she can stop herself. “Hey, please wait.”

But the woman doesn't. She hesitates, even turns, but then keeps on walking. 

With a sigh, oddly disappointed, Marcela walks home. 

 

*** 

 

“I saw someone in the village the other night,” Marcela tells her grandmother over breakfast the next morning. “Another girl. I didn't know there were any people my age left in the village.” 

She only ever refers to herself as a _girl_ when she talks to her grandmother, and she smirks as she says it, knows her grandmother won't take offense. That was the first thing she said to Marcela: won't you miss being with people who are like you, more than they are like me. But maybe she's wrong, or maybe it's the mood, something in the air this morning. Her grandmother scowls, eyes dark with disapproval. “There aren't. And you shouldn't be out that late. We are so close to the woods. Sometimes we have wolves roaming the street during the night, hungry, looking for food. It's not safe.” 

Marcela has been out every night since she arrived, and she hasn't seen any wolves. A few foxes, maybe, but certainly nothing that might eat her. But she nods and smiles, nibbles on her fresh bread with butter and jam while she glances out the window, thoughts wandering to pale white hair and just a moment of hesitation. 

 

*** 

 

That night she rents a movie on her laptop, sits through the whole thing even though the slow, spotty internet connection out here keeps dying on her, and has every intention to heed her grandmother's warning. She sits cross-legged on her bed, in her pajamas, wrapped into the same scratchy blanket her grandmother already owned when she was little. The computer is now on the mattress next to her, and she stares out of the window at the crescent moon. The sight is hypnotizing, captures her like it has captured every living thing for as long as there have been creatures crawling the face of the earth. 

She blinks, and shivers, and it's almost like her body is making decisions without her conscious mind's approval, because she gets up before she could decide to do so, swaps the pajamas for jeans, a shirt and a coat. She doesn't think about where she's going, walks the same route she did yesterday – not that there are many to choose from around here – past the long since closed corner store that’s falling apart because the only people left here shop at the market or grow their own food, and then a little further, and this time, when, suddenly, she sees the young woman, crossing the cobble stone street out of the blue, there's almost no distance between them at all. 

“Hey,” Marcela says again, closing the distance between then with a few jogged steps, and reaches out to touch the woman's shoulder. “Can I talk to you?” 

The woman pauses, turns around slowly, and Marcela is surprised to find her smiling, vaguely amused. She's beautiful, pale skin and piercing blue eyes to go with the bright blond hair. “Talk? You want to talk to me? That's all?” 

Marcela retracts her hand, made awkward by both the realization that her behavior might be inappropriate and by the sudden curl of heat low in her belly. “Uh, yes. There are only old people around and I'm bored, so I thought... I'm sorry, I'm being rude, aren't I?” 

“A little,” the woman says, cocking her head. She studies Marcela like there's a riddle written out on her face, like Marcela's a puzzle piece and she doesn't know where to put it yet. “But I don't mind. I'm bored too. What's your name?” 

“Marcela Ciobanu,” Marcela says, and it's so hard to avert her eyes, look somewhere else than directly into those blue eyes. “I'm visiting my grandmother. She lives up by the river.” 

The woman nods. She's the one to break eye contact, glancing in the direction of the river, the direction of the house “I see. My name is Crina.”

 _Crina._ A traditional name, and if Marcela's recollection of her grandmother's language holds, also the name of a flower. She doesn't offer a surname, and Marcela doesn't ask. Marcela hasn't spent more than a week every few years back at this place since she was a child. She's not familiar with the ways of her home anymore. Maybe it's odd, here, to share too many details with someone she's only just met. People are secretive in the villages at the foot of the mountain, still believe a photograph might steal your soul, throw salt over their shoulders every time they think they see a strange figure in the window. 

“Delighted to make your acquaintance,” Marcela does a curtsey – if she's overdoing it she might as well go all in, try and break the tension – and Crina laughs, holds out her hand.

“The pleasure is all mine,” she says. The contact between them when they shake is brief, but it leaves Marcela's skin tingling, runs up her arm like an electric current. Then Crina looks around, to the shadow of the woods, the mountains behind them, and her expression once again turns haunted. “I'm late. It'll be dawn soon. Meet me again, Marcela Ciobanu?” 

Marcela nods. She waves her goodbye, waits until Crina's run so far ahead that she's only a small, vanishing figure in the distance, and then turns to walk home with a smile on her face and the hope that there might be a purpose to her vacation in the land of her birth after all. 

Only when she’s back home, undressing to finally get into bed and sleep, does she notice that she’s still barefoot, never put on shoes as she left to meet her maiden in the moonlight. 

 

*** 

 

In her dreams that night, Marcela walks the street again. She walks much further than she's ever done before, walks until she arrives at a cottage near the woods. The old people murmur warnings of the woods, about strange animals and mystic beings, but Marcela doesn't believe in them. She's an urban child, and she has long since stopped believing there are monsters waiting in the shadows. She knocks on the door, straightening her dress, lace and linen, innocent white decorated with a red ribbon around the middle. The door is opened and she's greeted by Crina's smile, warm and bright and welcoming, and so so very happy that she's here. That's all she sees at first, looking at her face, looking into her eyes like they’re in a cheesy old song, and then her eyes roam, finding her new friend naked, skin completely bare. A sheen of moonlight that falls through the door paints the silhouette of trees and mountains onto her body. 

Crina opens her arms wide, and Marcela rushes into her embrace. It's as if there has never been a place she longed to be this much, and she's already wriggling out of her dress and leaving it to fall on the floor before either of them can even think to shut the door. Eyes hungry, almost predatory, Crina looks her over, head to toe, her gaze as intense as a lover's touch. She bends and pulls Marcela's underwear down her hips so that she's naked too, and then she folds their hands together and drags Marcela towards the large, old-fashioned bed, the only piece of furniture in the whole room. Marcela goes without hesitation or complaint, and she's already wet, desperate, when Crina lays her out on the bed, binds her to arms to the bedposts with silken shawls, then kneels in front of her and gently pushes her legs apart. 

She touches Marcela with single-minded focus, a delighted grin on her face as she slides two fingers inside her, playing her body like a familiar, beloved instrument. Next she bends to bring her mouth to Marcela's cunt, licks into her like she's been craving the taste for days, weeks, years, and Marcela arches off the bed, reaches out to rake her hand through Crina's long blond hair. She comes with a cry, eyes screwed shut against the wave of pleasure. 

When she opens them again, she is alone. Crina is gone. She glances to the open door, blinks in disbelief, betrayal sitting sourly in the pit of her stomach. She glances back to the bed and now a wolf sits between Marcela's legs, in the place where Crina was, dark gray fur, its teeth bared and red with blood, and reluctantly, in slow motion, horror slithering along her skin, Marcela looks down. She's wearing the dress again, lace and linen, but no red ribbon around her middle. In its stead... 

She screams. 

She wakes. 

 

***

 

Marcela doesn't fall back asleep. The dream fades, vague terror instead of clear memories, but it is enough to leave her apprehensive about the possibility that it might return when she closes her eyes, continue where it left off, and she remembers enough to know that's not something she wants. She uses up the battery on her phone by playing puzzle games and walks into the kitchen early, drawing a curiously quirked eyebrow from her grandmother. 

“Did you not sleep well?” she asks Marcela, and Marcela avoids her gaze, feeling caught, like she did when she was a teenager and snuck out to kiss the boys in her clique, and the girls too. 

She shakes her head and pads to the coffee machine, an ancient thing but it produces the best coffee Marcela has had in ages. “Bad dreams.” 

Her grandmother frowns, but then her expression softens and she strokes a hand over Marcela's messy bed hair. “That's the moon. You'll sleep better once it’s full again.” 

All the stories she's read, all the movies she's seen, claim that a full moon is what makes people restless, not a waning one, but she doesn't bother correcting that. It's probably just confusion, her grandmother's age beginning to get to her, and Marcela selfishly doesn't want to acknowledge that. She leans into the touch and hums, closing her eyes, yawning. 

 

***

 

They walk to the market together that evening, buying fresh produce and bread and meat, and it's on their way back that they pass the treeline. The sun has barely set, and still Marcela is uncomfortable and excited at the same time. She fears the wolf, now; she still craves the woman, a rare bright spot in the monotone and mundane life in the village. Her body sings with just the thought of Crina, and it occurs to her that she might just be about to replace one addiction with yet another. 

She shakes off the thought. How terrible can it be, an addiction to one specific person? It will hardly be her downfall, and if she knows herself at all, it might disappear as quickly as it came once she'll have satisfied it. Some do, some don't and she'll deal with whichever this one will be in the aftermath.

After the groceries are put away and the evening news and the game show her grandmother likes so much are watched, Marcela sits on her bed, still dressed, and waits for the moon to rise high in the sky. She all but runs down the cobble stone streets, her gaze ceaselessly wandering, looking for Crina. She finds her in an alleyway, not far from the local pub, busy on weekends and all but empty during the week. These are good people, her grandmother says, few drunkards and good-for-nothings to be had, and the pub exists to celebrate, not to despair. 

Crina smiles and bounces on her feet, and she rushes to meet her. The kiss is both unexpected and not the least bit surprising – it feels like fate. It feels like belonging. It feels like home. 

Backing her up against the rough stone wall, Marcela kisses back. Her skin is thrumming with arousal, wild need pulsing between her legs, and she doesn't even think to be ashamed or self-conscious or worried about bystanders when Crina turns them, pulls her t-shirt up and her bra down, licks around her areola then seals her lips to the nipple and sucks, does the same on the other side. Marcela pants, breathless and desperate, doesn't care if anyone overhears, wouldn't even care if anyone saw. Crina bites, gently, teeth grazing sensitive skin, and Marcela cries out, more with arousal than pain. Then she leans back, nothing touching Marcela's bare breasts anymore other than the chilly night air, and Marcela begs, in English, French, and also brokenly in her half-forgotten native language. 

After moments that stretch into centuries, feel like they've lasted long enough for stars to be reborn and die again, Crina leans back in. But she doesn't go back to teasing Marcela's nipples. She smiles, and runs her mouth down the sharp line of Marcela's jaw, and sinks her teeth into the skin low on Marcela's neck. 

Marcela freezes. It's not the first time a lover touched, kissed, nibbled her there, but this is different. This makes her pulse thrum with a different rhythm, and she pushes at Crina's shoulder, tries to get her off, make her back away. The bite becomes painful and Marcela is on the brink of panic, feels the life begin to flow out of her, and she screams, yells for help, a futile effort at night in a village that goes to sleep at dawn. 

She sees her life pass before her eyes, something she thought only happened in the movies. She sees Crina look up at her, sees her eyes glow red, the same color of the blood that she's stealing from Crina's body. Marcela thinks of her grandmother, the pain it will cause to bury the last of her family, her grandchild as well has her daughter, and she closes her eyes, too weak to keep them open. 

And then she opens them wide again, new strength flowing through her body that doesn't feel entirely like her own, and from her lips comes a chant in the language she's forgotten. Crina hisses, reels back, murder in her eyes, and then she turns around and runs, her long blonde hair flowing behind her. 

Marcela heaves a few deep breaths. She straightens her clothes. She pushes off the wall and walks home on shaky legs. She washes the blood off her neck and lies down on the bed, above the covers, falls asleep with her clothes on. 

 

*** 

 

When she wakes, the sun is already at its highest point. She slept half the day away and her limbs still feel heavy, like they're lined with lead, when she pushes herself up on her elbows. In the chair opposite the bed sits her grandmother, a large, old book on her lap and a sad smile on her face, and Marcela's hand unconsciously wanders to touch the teeth marks on her neck. She feels them tingling. 

“Oh my sweet child,” her grandmother says, flipping the book open to reveal handwritten text and crude drawings. “I have a story to tell you, about your family, about your heritage, about the pale women and the wolves and all the things I hoped you would never need to know.”


End file.
